


셋,삼

by Lirazel



Category: Infinite (Band), K-pop, SHINee
Genre: M/M, Multi, OT3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-28
Updated: 2014-03-28
Packaged: 2018-01-17 09:04:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1381720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lirazel/pseuds/Lirazel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kibum knows Lee Sungyeol doesn't like him at all. He also knows Lee Sungyeol likes Woohyun a little too much.</p>
            </blockquote>





	셋,삼

Lee Sungyeol is glaring at him again. Kibum waggles his eyebrows at him and Sungyeol’s scowl deepens before he turns away, just like he’s done any time Kibum has made eye contact with him over the past few weeks. Kibum chuckles, nudges Woohyun.

“I’m telling you, he’s totally into you,” he says, voice pitched low enough that only Woohyun will hear it.

Woohyun gives him a confused look, then follows Kibum’s gaze in time to see Sungyeol glance over his shoulder in their direction, then quickly turn away again when he meets Woohyun’s eyes. Woohyun shakes his head, turning his attention to straightening the buttons on his shirt. “You’re full of it. Or delusional. What have you been taking lately? I thought you said you were sticking to alcohol.”

“It’s _obvious_ , dumbass. Every time he sees me he looks at me like I ran over his demon cat. Or deleted his porn collection, more like. I’ve done nothing to him, so there’s no other explanation but that he wants in your pants and thinks I’m already there.”

Woohyun is now picking lint off of his shirt. “Okay, first of all, you _are_ already there. Second—you _must_ be on something if you think that Sungyeol is interested in anyone but women. You have no idea what it’s like living with him and listening to him talk about how horny he is and how he wants a girlfriend.”

“Overcompensating,” Kibum dismisses with a careless hand, which finally draws Woohyun’s attention to him again. 

Woohyun is a lot better at rolling his eyes than he was when they first became friends. Kibum is proud to take credit for that. “Not everyone is gay, Bum-ah.”

“I didn’t say he was gay. I’m not doubting he wants to bang every female who crosses his path. I’m just saying he wants to bang you, too.”

For a moment, a struggle flashes across Woohyun’s face, and then it’s gone with another firm shake of his head. “Not Sungyeol. Not me.” 

This guy is hopeless. Sometimes Kibum doesn’t know what he sees in Woohyun, really. “He’s here, isn’t he? With no reason to be? We’re filming, he’s not, and we don’t need him, but here he is.” 

“Yeah, _across the room talking to Jihyun-noona_ ,” Woohyun retorts, tone making it clear that he thinks Kibum is an idiot, which is hilarious, considering.

“Incompetently flirting, more like. How is it possible to be that desperate and that bad at flirting at the same time?”

“See? Flirting. With someone else. With a _woman_.”

“Did you miss the part where I told you it’s perfectly possible for him to be into women and you? You shouldn’t need me telling you that.” 

Woohyun’s cheeks flush lightly at Kibum’s knowing looking. It’s endearing. Oh, yeah, that’s what Kibum sees in him. “Kibum. I’m telling you. Sungyeol is _not_ into me. He’s here because he’s my friend and hasn’t seen me in a while and he could say hey to me and flirt with a pretty noona at the same time. He glares at you because he thinks you’re an asshole. And he’s not wrong.”

Kibum isn’t insulted by the label. He’d be the first to admit he can be a giant asshole. Most of the time he’s proud of it. “He wants you. Watch.”

He presses himself against Woohyun, smirking in Sungyeol’s direction, and seconds later, when Sungyeol’s eyes flicker away from Jihyun and back to Woohyun and Key across the room, Kibum slides a naughty hand down Woohyun’s hip and thigh. Sungyeol’s eyes darken, narrow, and Kibum could throw his head back and laugh in delight. 

Except that Woohyun shoves him away. “What the fuck are you doing?” he hisses, and the sheen of panic in his eyes melts away Kibum’s mirth. “There are people everywhere!” 

Sometimes Kibum forgets that their relationship isn’t an open secret the way Kibum’s proclivity for men is. Everyone in the industry knows, no one cares as long as Kibum doesn’t give any actual evidence to the public and start a scandal. Kibum’s as comfortable with that arrangement as he is with any other possibility at this point in his life—it’s not like he can be out and proud the way he’d like to be, and this is certainly better than trying to hide a huge part of himself. 

But Woohyun is different. Woohyun is still so insecure in so many ways, in ways that prickle with recognition under Kibum’s skin, a tickle of _you were like this once_. He was, before he had Key, before he constructed his armor of steel and flippant charm and snark. He remembers what it was like, being so vulnerable, all the many ways it was possible to be hurt, all the things he had to be scared of. Woohyun’s still there, and Kibum knows it’s a large part of why he loves him. Not so much that he sees himself when he looks at Woohyun, but that he sees who he could have been. Kibum had wanted to protect that person, that’s why he became Key. And now he wants to protect Woohyun, if he can. Woohyun needs a great deal of protecting.

And it’s true that Woohyun’s image rests far more on the idea of being the fangirls’ dream boyfriend than Kibum’s ever did, and so, yes, it would hurt Woohyun even within the industry if hints got out. People don’t understand bisexuality, Kibum has come to realize, wouldn’t understand that Woohyun can sincerely—ridiculously—mean the words he says about loving his fangirls, can be attracted to women and do all the things a perfect boyfriend would do, and also be with Kibum. 

Kibum would never put him in the position of trying to make people understand that, but sometimes Woohyun gets so anxious. Their closeness is part of ToHeart’s concept and everyone knows that Kibum is a playful flirt when he wants to be—no one’s going to read anything into Kibum touching Woohyun like that. No one except Lee Sungyeol.

Not that Woohyun believes that. 

“Didn’t you see his face? He wanted to rip me apart with his bare hands!”

“More like he was grossed out seeing one of his bandmates get molested in public,” Woohyun argues. “Seriously, let this go. You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

But if there’s anything Kim Kibum knows, it’s when one man is attracted to another. And Sungyeol wants Woohyun _bad_.

 

 

Kibum pulls up the dance version of “The Chaser” during a lull in filming. He’d liked the long hair on Sungyeol—it made him look older, edgier, less like an overeager clown and more like the kind of manly-pretty models Kibum had dated before Woohyun. Sungyeol might not be a dancer like Hoya or Dongwoo, but the choreo had definitely shown off his lines—Kibum would think his legs had been photoshopped to look longer if it weren’t for how short Woohyun’s look in the same shot. Sungyeol is hot, that much is for sure. His long fingers would look pretty against Woohyun’s jaw, abs, cock. 

“What was that—’I call him “my love”’? The PD was making jokes with the lighting crew about how you’re turning into me.” 

Kibum grins, catlike, when Woohyun flops down on the floor beside him, open water bottle in hand. “It’s the best friends concept. Greasy and hearts—don’t you know?”

Woohyun snorts, pushing his hair away from his forehead, and some stylist noona will chastise him later, but Kibum just thinks it makes him look rumpled and sexy, makes him wish he could drag Woohyun off to a bathroom and debauch him there. But there’s not enough time. There’s almost never enough time. He turns his attention back to the video instead.

“I thought the concept was to _combine_ our images, not have you turn into another me.”

“I was already another you,” Kibum says absently, watching the pretty flick of Sungyeol’s wrist in the video. “Just not this particular way.”

“What are you watching that for?” Woohyun asks, wiping his mouth with his wrist and passing the water bottle to Kibum. Kibum takes a drink before answering.

“You know, Sungyeol’s pretty hot. A little on the skinny side, and no ass, but pretty hot.”

Woohyun is cute when he’s incredulous. “Are you still on this? And are _you_ saying someone else is too skinny?”

Kibum chuckles. “Just saying I wouldn’t hate knowing that you’d gotten with him. You’d be hot together.”

For a moment Kibum is sure Woohyun’s eyes are going to glaze over with heat at the idea, but then he shakes his disbelief back into place. “That’s not going to _happen_. I’m with you, he’s not into me no matter what you say. And I wouldn’t _cheat_ on you even if he were.”

“It’s not cheating if I give you permission.” His voice is teasing, but it’s only half a joke. 

Woohyun, inexplicably, looks stricken. “I thought we were exclusive.”

The rawness of his voice makes Kibum’s stomach jump, and his fingers are laced with Woohyun’s before he knows it. He’s not one for those kinds of soppy gestures, but Woohyun sometimes needs them. “What the fuck, Hyun? You really thinking I’m banging other guys on the side? Where do you think I’m getting the time?” Kibum isn’t a cheater, but even if he were, he’d never cheat on Woohyun. 

Woohyun snorts, appeased. “Yeah.”

“You’ve ruined me for other guys, anyways. I barely look at anyone else.” Well, he looks. He can’t _not_ look. But he really doesn’t want anyone else but Woohyun, even if sometimes he can’t believe that himself. He hadn’t anticipated this, hadn’t imagined that he could have a relationship where he’s really _him_ , Kibum _and_ the Key he’s built himself into, and have someone get that. But there’s Woohyun.

“Can you just give it a rest? With the Sungyeol stuff?”

Woohyun suddenly sounds so tired that Kibum, who usually doesn’t drop things when people ask him to, shrugs. “If that’s what you want.” He tries to make it sound careless, but what Woohyun wants matters to him in ways he rarely allows other people’s desires to matter to him anymore. Taemin, Jinki, Nicole, his grandma: those are the only people he’s soft with. They’re the only ones he can _let_ himself be soft with. Them and Woohyun. 

“And don’t talk about how he’s hot anymore, it freaks me out.” Woohyun’s voice almost back to normal now, the command almost playful, and Kibum grins again as he lets their hands fall apart.

“I make no promises on that score. Not when I get this much entertainment value out of watching you be grossed out.”

Woohyun is about to start whining—Kibum can tell, he knows that curve of Woohyun’s lips, and if they were alone, he’d be crushing it with his own already—but then the PD calls for them again and it’s lights camera grease. Grease has never been part of who Kibum is, and he’d never wanted it to be, but now there’s Woohyun. And it’s not as bad as he’d thought it would be.

 

 

Kibum feels a smirk stretching his lips as he turns the corner and sees the tall figure approaching from the other end of the hall. Nice side effect of he and Woohyun practicing in the Woollim building today, as far as Kibum’s concerned. But judging by the scowl on Lee Sungyeol’s face, he wouldn’t agree.

Kibum isn’t surprised at all when Sungyeol just tries to push past him without even acknowledging him other than the scowl, but Sungyeol didn’t seem to expect Kibum to take a step in front of him, blocking his path. 

“Get out of my way,” Sungyeol says in what’s probably the closest he can get to a growl, and the grin on Kibum’s face widens. Okay, so Sungyeol can be annoying as hell, obnoxiously loud or immature in front of the cameras, weak in his dancing and singing, always getting hurt and making Woohyun worry, but he can also be pretty cute, apparently. Kibum had never noticed.

“Is that any way to speak to your sunbae? You didn’t even greet me!”

“Since when do you care about polite behavior?”

Kibum tilts his head back, running his eyes over Sungyeol’s body. Yeah, skinny, and his face is lacking a strong nose or jawline like Kibum usually prefers, but his upper arms are more defined than Kibum would have thought, and he’s got quite a mouth on him, in more ways than one. “I’m pretty well-known for valuing honesty more than politeness,” he acknowledges. “But then, you’re pretty well-known for the same thing, right?” Normally, Kibum would make sure to get a dig in about how Sungyeol’s less well-known than he is, but a plan is forming in his mind, and he doesn’t have time to get sidetracked by Sungyeol’s indignation, so he swallows that remark down. That’s not how he wants to play this.

But Sungyeol’s eyes darken anyway, clearly displeased at the suggestion that they have something in common. “Okay, so, honestly: I want you to get the fuck out of my way.”

“I don’t think so. Not right now. Right now, I think we need to have a little talk.”

There’s a flash of something that could be surprise or fear or something else altogether in Sungyeol’s eyes, but then he sets his jaw. “I have nothing to talk about with you.”

“Didn’t we just say we’re both supposed to be the honest ones? Are you really going to tell me we don’t need to talk about Woohyun?”

That same flash again, and this time Kibum is sure that Sungyeol’s cheeks go a shade whiter. Kibum’s developed a weakness for darker skin of late, likes the way his own paleness looks up against Woohyun’s golden hue, but he can’t deny that the softness of Sungyeol’s skin is appealing.

Sungyeol clearly can’t come up with a response to that, jaw working in frustration, and he finally settles for trying to push by Kibum again, but Kibum takes advantage of his quickness and grabs Sungyeol by the arm—it’s wider around than it looks—and jerks him into the practice room they’d been standing just outside of. He isn’t going to risk anyone hearing this.

He gets Sungyeol inside by virtue of surprise, but Sungyeol’s taller and stronger than him, so he yanks his arm free pretty quickly. “Get your filthy hands off of me!”

Kibum can tell that Sungyeol is about to rush out of the room, so he goes for the straightforward route. It’s what he prefers anyway. “Is that your problem with me? You don’t like that my filthy hands get to touch Woohyun?”

Sungyeol’s eyes go wide, and for a second he looks like his body is trying to decide whether to rush Kibum or to drop to the floor, but then he just takes a single step forward, his mouth—a very, very tempting mouth, now that Kibum is looking at it from this close—making circles as round as his eyes with each word. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

Kibum would make a dry statement about overuse of language robbing it of its power, but he only has a few minutes before Woohyun will show up to practice, and he needs to get this over with before then. It would be a disaster if Woohyun walked in in the middle of it. Not that Kibum couldn’t extricate himself from it, but he’d really rather not have to. “Woohyun is my boyfriend. I can touch him whenever I want to—whenever he wants me to.”

There are sparks in Sungyeol’s bright eyes. “You touch him in _public_. On television. ‘My Hyun-hyun,’ ‘my love,’” he mimics in a voice so ridiculous Kibum can’t even be annoyed. “You’re putting him at risk.”

Oh, so that’s how Sungyeol’s going to play it? Kibum would laugh if he weren’t trying to accomplish something. “Please. We’re best friends. Probably the most famous best friends in kpop. We’re doing fanservice. The fangirls make jokes about us being boyfriends, but no one thinks Woohyun is gay. You need to relax.”

The words seem to make something flare up inside Sungyeol, and he seems taller now, sturdier, filling up more of the room. “ _You_ need to stop treating it like a joke and stop risking his career!”

Kibum’s amusement cools, and his eyes are narrow and his voice warning as he answers. “I would _never_ do anything to put him at risk. And it’s not your place to tell either one of us what to do.”

“I’m his _friend_.”

Kibum’s laugh has a mocking edge as he rolls his eyes at that. “Yeah, this is all friendship speaking. I hope your acting is more convincing in front of the camera than this little performance is.” It’s a low blow, but Kibum is done with this protective-friend shit. “I’ve seen the way you look at him.”

Sungyeol looks like he’s considering denying it, but Kibum feels a grudging respect when he doesn’t even try. “Oh, is that what this is? A stay-away-from-my-boyfriend talk?”

Again, Kibum laughs. “Not hardly. Woohyun’s a big boy, and he loves me, and I’m really not worried about you sweeping him off his feet and carrying him away from me. You wouldn’t get very far even if you tried.” 

Kibum really wishes he could identify that look that flashes again in Sungyeol’s eyes. “I wasn’t trying to sweep him off his feet.”

“Well, that’s good to know. You’re not as pathetic as I thought.”

Kibum has heard enough about Sungyeol from Woohyun to know that ‘pathetic’ is probably the word Sungyeol is most vulnerable to, but he doesn’t feel sorry for using it, not for this. _He’s as fragile as Woohyun. How the fuck have either one of them made it this far in this industry?_

Sungyeol’s cheeks are red now, but the rest of his face is even paler than before. “You’re such a fucking ass.”

“Yeah, my ass does get fucked. And I fuck other asses too.” He doesn’t need to say, _Like Woohyun’s_. Lee Sungyeol is a lot of things, but he’s not stupid.

“You’re foul,” Sungyeol spits. “Woohyun’s too good for you.”

In any other circumstance, Kibum would make it clear that no one is too good for the Almighty Key, but this is a situation he’s never been in before, and that’s not what he needs to say. “But he still chose me,” he says instead. “He’s with _me_. And you can hate me all you want, but that’s not going to change. What it might do is make Woohyun pull away from you.”

“This is what you pulled me in here for? So you can gloat about that?” Sungyeol is like a live wire; Kibum hasn’t ever seen this side of him before—all that insecurity and vulnerability is still there, but he’s fighting tooth and nail not to let Kibum’s words hurt him, or at least to not let that hurt _show_. 

_He’s so much like Woohyun_ , Kibum thinks, and it doesn’t make him like Lee Sungyeol, but maybe he doesn’t dislike him either. Liking doesn’t really matter. What matters is that Sungyeol and Woohyun are friends, and Sungyeol is out of his mind for Woohyun, and Kibum doesn’t want Woohyun to turn into him. He doesn’t want Woohyun to have to craft his own armor, to wear it so often that sometimes he forgets it’s armor and that it can be removed.

“I pulled you in here to make it clear that if he ever lets you in, it’ll be with my permission.”

Sungyeol’s eyes narrow in confusion. “What?”

God, why can’t this guy keep up? “It’s not just that you want him, right? It’s not just that. If it were just that, I’d have already asked you if you were up for a threesome, just to get it out of your system.” Sungyeol chokes at that, but Kibum doesn’t have time to coddle him. The guy _wants_ everyone to know how much porn he watches. He doesn’t get to pretend to be innocent now. “You’re crazy for him, and that’s a different thing. He’s in denial right now, he can’t even see it, but sooner or later if you keep this up, he’ll have to admit it to himself.”

Sungyeol seems to have marginally recovered from his brain shutting down at the idea of a threesome. “So you’re telling me to get over it before he does, is that it?”

“That’s one of your options, yeah.” At least he’s keeping up this much. “The other is to tell him.”

Sungyeol just stares at him incredulously for a moment and then he lets out a laugh that doesn’t sound amused at all. Kibum is impressed; he hadn’t thought Sungyeol had a sound that cynical inside him. Sometimes Kibum forgets that other people are the same age as him: he feels a million years old, surrounded by naive little kids. “You want to see him shut me down. That’s what you want. Fuck, I always knew you were an asshole, but I had no idea you’re that cold.”

That would sting, if Kibum hadn’t built his armor long ago. “I’m absolute zero when I want to be. You should be glad you haven’t seen that. But that’s not what this is. This time you’re just in way over your head. I don’t care whether he shuts you down or not. He can if he wants to. He can do whatever the hell he wants to do. That’s the point.”

Woohyun has always said that Sungyeol is smart. _Not book-smart—he’s never studied enough for that. But sharp. Quick. When his insecurities don’t trip him up._ And now is Sungyeol’s chance to prove it.

He does. And the emotion that lightnings across his face is disgusted and hopeful and horrified and hungry all at once. This is exactly where Kibum meant to go. “You’re his _boyfriend_.”

“And that’s not going to change.” 

“So what the fuck—why are you suggesting he get with—” Sungyeol breaks off, like he can’t say the word ‘me,’ and finishes with “—other guys?” instead.

This isn’t going fast enough for Kibum’s taste. “Don’t be precious, Sungyeol, it’s just annoying. I’ve pointed out guys who are into him before, and he’s never reacted the way he does with you. He doesn’t do denial, not like this. But denial’s what it is.”

Kibum doesn’t know Sungyeol well, but he knows Woohyun, and so he recognizes that slight shift of Sungyeol’s jaw as hope stirring. “We’re members. We’ve lived together for years, team dynamics, we—”

Kibum wants to move through this part of the conversation as quickly as possible, but Sungyeol is not making it easy for him. “That’s not it. He still wouldn’t do denial. He’d sit you down and talk to you about it and be very clear. You know how much he cares about Infinite. He’d be scared to death to deal with it, but he’d still put Infinite first.”

Sungyeol swallows, suddenly looking almost frail, and Kibum had never noticed before today how Sungyeol’s presence can expand or contract that way—fill up a room with energy, then look delicate and tiny the next moment. Woohyun is like that, too. “You mean…?”

“I mean, he has feelings of some kind for you, too,” Kibum snaps impatiently. “I don’t know what they are, and I don’t know whether he’d ever want to act on them, but he has them and he deserves a chance to deal with them. So you need to get over him so he can get over you or you need to get off your ass and tell him how you feel about him so he can decide what he wants to do.”

Sungyeol sounds part-amazed, part-horrified, part-skeptical. “You really think I can just _tell_ Woohyun _that_?”

“Tell me what?” 

Sungyeol spins around so fast his limbs look like they’ve gotten all tangled up, but Kibum isn’t surprised; he’d heard the door open. He hadn’t quite managed to get Sungyeol all the way through everything he needs to get through, but he got close enough. Idols never have time enough, not for anything.

“Hyung!” Sungyeol gasps, and he doesn’t call Woohyun that very much, Kibum can tell by the way Woohyun’s confusion-creased eyebrows soften as he looks at Sungyeol. But then he turns his attention to Kibum, his eyes suspicious.

“What’s going on?” There’s a warning edge to his voice. 

“Sungyeol and I were just chatting,” Kibum says, voice breezy. He didn’t expect Woohyun to fall for it, and he doesn’t.

“Chatting. You two.”

Kibum shrugs, offering him an innocent smile, and Woohyun rolls his eyes in response. “You two don’t chat. You hate each other.”

“I don’t hate him,” Kibum corrects. “When he’s not being annoying, he’s not that bad.”

Woohyun and Sungyeol give him identical looks of disbelief. “Bum, you’ve always been an asshole to him,” Woohyun says.

“Yeah, but I’m an asshole to everyone. It doesn’t mean I hate them.” Woohyun is about to answer that, but Kibum turns to Sungyeol before he can. “Okay, ToHeart practice time. Get out.”

“I _want_ to know what you two were talking about.” Woohyun is really fucking adorable when he’s being demanding like that. Kibum pats his head, knowing it will annoy him. 

“Out, Lee.”

Sungyeol, who’s had an expression like a tornado is ripping through his brain for a while now, manages to give Kibum a dirty look, and then he’s saying, “Bye, hyung,” and hurrying out of the room, leaving Kibum and Woohyun alone.

Woohyun fastens a look he probably thinks is formidable onto his face as he turns to face Kibum square on. “Tell me what you two were talking about.”

“Nope.”

“I’m not starting practice until you tell me.”

“It’s his to decide. He can tell you if he wants to. If you want to know so bad, ask him.”

Woohyun is clearly not pleased by the answer, but it’s scheduled practice time and they have a performance tonight, so he plays the professional like he always does, rolls his eyes, and stomps over to the stereo to flip it on. 

And now Kibum just has to wait. Do his job, and wait.

 

 

 

Woohyun is pale under his makeup when he shows up to the interview two days later, and Kibum is pretty sure he knows why. Well. One of them was braver than he’d really expected either of them to be, so that’s something. He’d thought it would take a lot longer for this whole thing to blow up in their faces.

But he can’t tell from Woohyun’s face what Woohyun’s reaction was—other than shock, which is pretty clear—and there isn’t time to ask before the interview. So Kibum focuses on his job: being entertaining, offering insightful comments, and lacing it all with snarkiness that never dips over the line into offensive. He’s gotten good at setting aside the thing he really cares about in the moment to focus on what he has to, and he knows he’s doing exactly what the interviewer and the company want him to do. It’s what he always does. The interview does feel longer than they usually do, though.

Afterwards, miraculously, their managers tell them they have time to actually take a lunch instead of choking something down on the way to somewhere else, but this is something Kibum actually can sideline for more important things. So ten minutes later he and Woohyun are in a training room alone and he’s saying, “So you talked to Sungyeol,” and trying to figure out what other emotions are in Woohyun’s eyes under the glaze of shock.

“Yeah,” Woohyun answers, voice hollow, and it’s hard to believe that fifteen minutes ago he was making the interviewer laugh and play with her hair as he unleashed his charm on her. Woohyun is good at compartmentalizing, too. He wouldn’t have lasted this long in the industry if he weren’t: it’s the one thing every single idol learns or they don’t become an idol.

Woohyun is staring at a wall instead of Kibum, and Kibum shifts his feet. That’s not something Woohyun usually does. “Just what did he say?” It doesn’t really matter what words Sungyeol used, but for some reason Kibum suddenly finds himself wanting to delay asking how Woohyun answered.

“He said you told him to tell me, and that’s why he was telling me. He said he didn’t want me to feel pressured and he respected my relationship so he never would have told me if you hadn’t told him to.”

That wasn’t exactly what Kibum was asking, but okay. All of that’s true enough. “Yeah, I told him you deserved to know.”

Still the hollow voice and the wall-staring. “He said you said I have feelings for him.”

Kibum can’t imagine that Sungyeol came out and said that—he’s not emotionally competent enough to have been comfortable saying it like that. It would have been something like, ‘Kibum thinks you might...you know...too…’ Something stuttering and awkward and half-defiant: it’s not that hard to picture. 

It’s much harder to understand why Woohyun is still so pale and won’t look at him. Kibum would sort of like to touch him in some way, rest a hand on his hip or his shoulder, but he doesn’t. Instead, eyebrows dipping, he says, “Well, you do, don’t you?”

Woohyun is quiet and still for a moment, and discomfort scratches its way along Kibum’s skin. Then Woohyun blinks and focuses his eyes on Kibum. “Why did you tell him all that?”

Okay, this has gone in a direction Kibum hadn’t anticipated. He’d thought that Woohyun would be happy—amused at his gall and disbelieving that Kibum would actually come up with the idea, but happy—or else angry that Kibum didn’t talk to him first. Or he’d have turned Sungyeol down and would be annoyed that Kibum went behind his back. Not...terrifyingly blank. Woohyun pulls inside himself sometimes, but he doesn’t look _blank_. Kibum really doesn’t know what’s going on, and that is not a feeling he’s used to.

“I told you. I thought you deserved to know. I didn’t want it to make things awkward for you down the road, not when I could help make things easier now. Hyun?” He takes a half step towards Woohyun, who is looking down at his own hands, and that’s when he notices that those hands are shaking. “Woohyun!”

But Woohyun’s head snaps up, and his eyes are glassy, and Kibum’s head swirls, and Woohyun says, “Did you really think that was a choice I wanted to make?”

Okay, _what_? Kibum understands it might have been awkward turning Sungyeol down, but this is not that kind of reaction at all. Was he upset that he had to hurt Sungyeol’s feelings? “He had to know there was a chance you’d say no, Woohyun. He’s not an idiot.”

“A chance?” Woohyun’s voice is raspy and hollow at the same time. “You really thought there was a chance I’d say yes?”

No, this doesn’t make any sense. Of course Woohyun isn’t as comfortable with his sexuality as Kibum is; he’s had a lot less time to get used to it, and Kibum actually doesn’t expect everyone to be as open to as many things as he is. But Woohyun usually acts flustered and embarrassed covered with demands of ‘how dare you?’ when Kibum suggests something he hadn’t been ready for. Nothing like this. Yeah, the idea was unorthodox, but Kibum is beginning to think that that look in Woohyun’s eyes is heartbreak or betrayal or something equally huge, and that does not make any sense at all.

“A chance, yes,” he says, because he _had_ thought there was a chance. It wasn’t a sure thing, of course, but there was a chance.

Woohyun is suddenly right in front of him, hands grasping the lapels of Kibum’s jacket, bottom lip trembling. “So you were right that I have feelings for him, but did you really think he’s the one I’d choose? Is that why you had to force my hand?”

Kibum stares at Woohyun for a moment, the place where his brain usually is transformed into a void of nothingness. And then his mind snaps back into place and he understands what this is, and then he’s throwing back his head and laughing, hands sliding down Woohyun’s chest, and Woohyun looks shocked like earlier but maybe also angry, but Kibum can’t stop laughing, can barely choke out, “You total fucking idiot! Have you always been this stupid? I’m never telling anyone you’re my other self again!”

“What?” Woohyun’s question can’t decide whether to be confused or angry. 

“You idiot! I wasn’t making you choose! God, do you think I’d have talked to Sungyeol at all if that was what I was going for? If I thought you might seriously leave me for him, I’d have dumped you first!”

“You—what—?”

Kibum is laughing so hard that his abs are aching, but he still can’t stop. “I wasn’t asking you to choose between us! I just wanted you to be able to be with him too if you wanted to be!” 

“What?”

That seems to be all Woohyun can say, and that’s even funnier, but Kibum fights through his laughter to say, “Just seeing him on the side, too, or a threesome or whatever—I told you he was hot, didn’t I? Why did you think I said that? Just once or a few times or for however long you wanted to. I wasn’t—fuck, Woohyun, did you really think—” Laughter overtakes him again, and Kibum is about to drop to his knees with the force of it when both of Woohyun’s hands smack into his chest. Kibum staggers a step back at the shove, and then comes another.

“Ya! You asshole! Are you laughing at me right now?” Woohyun shouts, except his face isn’t pale and his eyes aren’t glassy anymore, and Kibum knows that twist to Woohyun’s lips—he’s trying to look pissed even though he wants to laugh. It just makes Kibum laugh harder. He waves his hand, tears springing from his eyes.

“You can’t even be nice when I thought you thought I wanted someone more than you and were being all manipulative and I was scared and—ya! Stop laughing, you asshole!”

Except now Woohyun is laughing too.

 

 

Kibum runs his eyes over Sungyeol. He’s still standing awkwardly at the foot of the bed, hands fidgeting with the sides of his jacket—the one he hasn’t even taken off yet. He’s gnawing on his lip, too, and interest curls in Kibum’s stomach at the sight of it, plush and red. No, this probably won’t be so bad. “Are you going to stand there all night?” Kibum demands, stretching himself out on the mattress and wanting to laugh as Sungyeol’s cheeks flush and his eyes skitter away from Kibum’s naked form. And this is the guy who has the largest porn collection in Infinite.

“Well, excuse me, but I’ve never had a threesome before,” Sungyeol says, jerking his jacket off, and Kibum is glad to see he can still be snarky even when he’s this nervous. The snarkiness is kind of sexy. It could be fun later. 

“Have you ever had _sex_ before?” Kibum demands, shifting his focus to where Woohyun has shucked off his shirt and is now pulling down his pants. Not everyone can get naked as quick as Kim Kibum, he supposes.

“Not _gay_ sex,” Sungyeol snaps, drawing Kibum’s attention again. His hands had been hesitating at the hem of his shirt, but when Kibum’s arches an eyebrow at him, he tears the shirt over his head. And yeah, more definition than Kibum would have thought. Not that Kibum can say much about that. Not that he really cares either way—Woohyun provides him with more than enough musculature to trace.

Woohyun pulls off his boxers and bounces onto the bed beside Kibum. Kibum had thought he’d be nervous, too, his first time with Sungyeol, but it must be because Kibum is there that Woohyun just seems excited.

“It’s not gay sex, really, since only one person in this room is actually gay,” Woohyun says, eyes shining as he looks up at Sungyeol. Sungyeol drops his eyes and starts to fumble with his jeans’ zipper; it’s pretty cute.

“It’s gay sex for me,” Kibum says. “And I trump everything.”

Woohyun rolls his eyes and addresses Sungyeol. “Don’t worry. He’s very bossy in bed, which actually makes it easier the first time, though it kind of gets annoying after that. Ya! Stop hitting me!”

Sungyeol takes advantage of Woohyun and Kibum’s brief tussle to shed his underwear, and when Kibum looks back up at him, he’s clearly trying to keep himself from crossing his legs and shrinking in on himself. Kibum is about to say something snarky to make him defensive instead of nervous, but Woohyun shifts to perch on his knees on the edge of the bed and reaches his arms up, looping them around Sungyeol’s neck. Sungyeol’s ears are flaming red, the back of his neck pink, but he lets himself be pulled against Woohyun and down for a kiss. 

It’s not their first kiss, but it’s the first time Kibum has seen them, and it’s definitely their first naked kiss. Kibum lies back against the pillows and takes it in, and yeah, he was right: Sungyeol soft skin and pale limbs look amazing next to Woohyun’s darker, harder body. Sungyeol’s long fingers curling into the hair at the nape of Woohyun’s neck is one of the sexier sights Kibum has seen, especially when paired with the little whimpering sound Woohyun lets out. No, this won’t be bad at all. And if it makes Woohyun happy, well, that was Kibum’s intention all along.


End file.
